Jason Craig as the title character in the play "Beowulf: A Thousand Years of Baggage."Credit
Jensen Studios

“Beowulf” is a fairly odd tale as originally written, what with all the devourings and dismemberings. But the surgery being administered to it at the Abrons Arts Center transforms it into something well beyond odd; something almost unprocessable.

That’s not to say that this stage version, “Beowulf: A Thousand Years of Baggage,” makes no sense. In some ways it makes more sense than the real thing. It is merely to note that the rollicking incongruity of this production from the Bay Area sends the brain into a sort of does-not-compute mode. Maybe it’s the combination of legendary monster-killer and klezmer music.

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Shaye Troha, left, and Anna Ishida in "Beowulf: A Thousand Years of Baggage."Credit
Jensen Studios

The show, presented by the Shotgun Players and Banana Bag & Bodice, is not content merely to retell the “Beowulf” story in skewed musical fashion. The first people we see are three stuffy academics (Jessica Jelliffe, Christopher Kuckenbaker and Beth Wilmurt) who are engaged in a discussion of “Beowulf.” Apparently their pretentiousness disturbs the cosmos enough that Beowulf himself (Jason Craig, who also wrote the play and lyrics) feels he must put in an appearance.

And that’s when a thrashing, bashing rendition of the “Beowulf” story beings. Mr. Craig is hilariously revenge-of-the-nerdy as Beowulf, his heroic posturing notably at odds with his paunch and his glasses. And those academics turn out to have darker aspects to their personalities: they become Grendel and the other beasts Beowulf confronts.

It’s all done to music (composed by Dave Malloy) that demands to be described as demented; the instruments include accordion, guitar, trombone and saw. The singing starts out as wretched, presumably by design, so that when someone with a real voice shows up (Ms. Jelliffe as Grendel’s angry mother) the effect is striking.

Though the original epic poem is obliterated by this juggernaut, a snippet of it is artfully deployed late in the play. And who would have thought that a production as full of noise as this one could end on a note approaching poignancy? It’s the last surprise in a play full of them.